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REMINDER TO L.A. EMPLOYERS: NOTICE POSTING, MINIMUM WAGE, AND PAID SICK LEAVE REQUIREMENTS START ON
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Starting July 1, 2016, employers located within the City of Los Angeles, as well as those located outside the City who have employees working at least 2 hours in any week within the geographic boundaries of the City of Los Angeles MUST comply with the City's new minimum wage ordinance ("Ordinance"). Below are the major highlights of the Ordinance:
Notice Posting
As part of the Ordinance, beginning July 1st, covered employers are required to post a notice in a conspicuous place at any workplace or job site in English, and in any of the following languages where at least five percent (5%) of the employees at the workplace or jobsite speak that language: Spanish, Chinese (Cantonese and Mandarin), Hindi, Vietnamese, Tagalog, Korean, Japanese, Thai, Armenian, Russian or Farsi.
An employer is subject to penalties for non-compliance. You can find the English version of the poster here: (English version). For those needing the poster in other languages, go to: (Other languages)
Minimum Wage Increase
- For employers with 26 or more employees, the minimum wage will increase to $10.50 per hour starting July 1, 2016.
- For employers with 25 or fewer employees or certain larger nonprofit corporations with 26 or more employees, the compliance deadline is July 1, 2017.
Paid Sick Leave
As we previously reported, employers must begin to comply with the paid sick leave portion of the Ordinance beginning July 1, 2016. To comply, an employee must accrue paid sick leave using either one of the following two methods: (1) accrue sick days at the rate of one hour per every 30 hours worked, beginning July 1, 2016 (that's a total of 69.26 hours or 8.66 days for a full time employee working 2080 hours/year); or (2) "front load" the sick leave hours, provided the employer front loads at least 48 hours of paid sick leave to employees on July 1, 2016 and annually thereafter.
Since our last update, we received clarification from the City of Los Angeles' Bureau of Contract Administration on a number of important issues:
- (1) Regardless of whether an employer opts to front load or accrue the sick pay, the employer MUST permit paid sick leave to carry over from year to year. However, with respect to the carryover hours, the Ordinance permits employers to place a cap of 72 hours on the carryover (a total of 9 days for a full time employee working 2080 hours/year) IF the employer has a clearly worded policy to that effect. Otherwise, the employer must permit employees to carryover any unused sick pay hours from year to year.
- (2) Employers with 25 or fewer employees are not required to comply with the paid sick leave provisions until July 1, 2017; and
- (3) The Ordinance does not apply to employees who are properly classified as exempt from overtime pay.
To discuss your specific organization or if you have any questions about the contents of this article, please contact any member of the Firm. We can be reached at (818) 508-3700 or visit us online at www.brgslaw.com.
Sincerely,
Richard S. Rosenberg
Katherine A. Hren
Jessica A. Gomez
Ballard Rosenberg Golper & Savitt, LLP
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